


Play Stupid Games

by vintagecassette



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Blood and Injury, Canon-Typical Violence, F/M, Fluff, Homophobia, Homophobic Language, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, John Winchester gets his ass handed to him, M/M, Past Abuse, Post-Finale, Slow burn but instead of waiting for a kiss you’re waiting for John to get punched in the face, Weddings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-21
Updated: 2021-02-21
Packaged: 2021-03-18 23:15:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 7
Words: 5,202
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29616936
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vintagecassette/pseuds/vintagecassette
Summary: In which John Winchester wins stupid prizes.Inspired by “Fuck Around and Find Out” by lizstiel, along with any other fic in which Castiel beats the shit out of John Winchester.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester, Eileen Leahy/Sam Winchester, John Winchester/Mary Winchester
Comments: 45
Kudos: 200





	1. Chapter 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A prologue of sorts.

Try as he might, Castiel just couldn’t get Jack to keep John Winchester in hell.

“He’s their father,” he kept saying.

“Not all fathers are good,” Castiel told him.

“But Sam and Dean are good, and you’re good, so all fathers must be at least a little bit good.”

The flawed faith of a Winchester. That blind belief in goodness, impossible to shake no matter how the world burns them.

He compromises. Helps Jack rebuild the old Winchester house — far from the bunker, very far — and lets John and Mary settle in.

They’ll meet, he decides, when the time is right.

* * *

The wedding is the happiest day of Castiel’s life, plain and simple. It’s a massive affair; the roadhouse is packed with hunters, stuffy and sweaty and smelling like beer. Jack is there and Bobby is there and Jo and Charlie and Rufus and Kevin and Mary and Adam and everyone else, everyone whose paths ever intertwined on this long, long road, even Rowena and Crowley on a day trip from hell with a special little visa Jack drew up himself, even they are here, beaming, celebrating. Music crackles through the speakers just a little too loud, and Dean’s eyes are wide and bright, and he kisses Castiel like it’s the end of the world even though it finally isn’t anymore. The wedding is pure, giddy glee, raw and shining, overflowing with joy.

John Winchester is not invited.

He is sectioned off to his heavenly house, his house that’s an exact copy of the one his wife died in, and when Mary returns late at night with the flush of happiness and alcohol in her cheeks, she tells him she was just out drinking.

When Castiel and Dean leave for their heavenly honeymoon the next morning, John is none the wiser.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This fic is only around 5k words, but it'll be broken up into chapters for the sake of folks who (like me) have literally no attention span. Clicking through chapters at light speed always feels better than dragging yourself through one long chunk of text.
> 
> Also: Let it be known that I am, in fact, a baby Jack truther, but that didn’t really fit into this story as I was writing it.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An invitation is extended. Castiel scopes out the scene.

It’s a long time before Castiel thinks about John Winchester again. He’s seated at the kitchen table, Dean by his side, book open in front of one and a plate of eggs and bacon in front of the other, when Sam appears in the doorway.

“Hey,” he says. “I’ve got some news.”

Dean takes a swig of his coffee. “What kind?”

“The good kind, I think,” Sam says. He glances to his right, where Eileen has leaned around the doorframe beside him.

“Your mom wants to have us over for dinner,” she says, smiling.

Shifting slightly in his seat, Dean raps his knuckles against the table. “All of us?” he asks. “At her place?”

Eileen bobs a closed fist up and down in affirmation, and Sam says, “Dad hasn’t seen much of you since we… you know, made it up here. She figured we could catch up.”

“And she wants all of us to come?” Castiel says, waiting for the answer to Dean’s question that he can tell Sam is skirting around.

“It was sort of an open invitation.” Sam rubs at the back of his neck. “But I think it’d be cool for Dad to meet you, Cas, and I’m bringing Eileen. We can make it a —”

“If you say double date, so help me, Sammy, I’ll —”

“Alright,” Sam says, lifting his hands in mock surrender and failing to hide the grin on his face. “Just think about it. We’re heading over at seven.”

With that, he leaves, Eileen on his heels — but she ducks back in to throw a quick sign in Dean’s direction. _Don’t be a party pooper_. Then she’s out the door.

* * *

John Winchester is not a difficult man to find.

The first place Castiel checks is the old garage, and there he is, head in an engine, ass in the air. “Hello,” he says, and John smacks his head against the popped hood.

“Hello?” John repeats, ducking underneath it as he turns around. One hand is pressed to the crown of his skull, rubbing at it with frustration. He gives Castiel a fleeting once-over; sizes him up. After a moment, he seems to decide a cordial mask is the best one to put on. “Somethin’ I can help you with?”

“I don’t believe we’ve met.”

“No, I don’t think we have.” John holds out a hand; Castiel makes no effort to shake it. Without missing a beat, John reaches past him, grabbing an oil-stained rag off a work table and using it to scrub at his hands. “John Winchester,” he says. It’s even. Calculated. “And you are?”

“Castiel.”

John just blinks at him, holding that perfectly benign half-smile in place on a face smeared with grease. “You must know my boys,” he says after a moment.

_They’re not yours, John Winchester. Those boys are not yours._ “I do. They’re good men.”

“Good men,” John echoes, tossing the rag aside. He chuckles to himself; he sounds proud. As if any of the good parts of those two came from him.

And Castiel stiffens, because he sees Dean in this man, sees all the parts of him that Dean sees when he looks at himself through their enemies’ eyes, in the curl of his knuckles and the set of his jaw. This man is everything Castiel has fought to prove that Dean is not, tucked neatly under the facade of an all-American man.

“Are you here for anything specific?” John asks, shaking him from his thoughts.

“Uh, no.” Not technically a lie. He just wants to see him, to see what he’s like. “I just thought I’d… meet the man who raised the Winchester brothers. See where they came from.”

John nods, thoughtful. “Well, it’s real nice to meet you, Castiel, but I should be heading in. Mary’s getting dinner ready. Gotta wash up.”

“Of course.” Castiel watches in silence as John gives him a nod, drops the hood, and heads inside.

He dedicates the next few hours to thinking of all the ways his fist could find a home in John Winchester’s jaw.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Cas would like to request permission to punch, and permission will soon be granted.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dean gets ready for dinner.

Dean spends the whole afternoon getting ready.

“You seem tense,” Castiel says, watching Dean try on his fourth flannel in a row. This one’s blue, with shades of green checkered through.

“I just… I haven’t really talked to him in a while, you know?” Dean is messing with the cuffs, trying to work them up to just the right spot on his forearms. “There was that thing I told you about a while back — the time thing, where he got his ass zapped to 2019 and we had that happy little family dinner. And it was great, I mean, he’s my dad. I missed him. But right before he left, he… he said he was proud of me. Of us. Me and Sam.” He drums his hands on his thighs, leaning back against the sink.

“And I just got to thinkin’ — he couldn’t tell me that when I was alive. Not when I taught Sammy how to read, not when I scraped a B in history freshman year, not when I ganked my first werewolf. He was never proud.” He leans forward; tugs off the flannel; fishes another one out of the drawer. “It took me savin’ the world to get him to look at me like anything more than some snot-nosed kid he was stuck hauling across the country. And I was, don’t get me wrong — I was a little shit for as long as I can remember — but never to him. I tried so hard to impress him, but it never worked.

“Sam he was proud of. Even when he went off to college, no matter how pissed Dad acted, he was proud. I just couldn’t get that from him. Thought I didn’t deserve it.”

Dean clears his throat. Lets a little _hmm_ pass through his lips. “You know, one time,” he says, “my dad got possessed. Guess how I figured out it wasn’t him.” He doesn’t wait for Castiel to respond. “He finally said it. Said I’d made the right call saving his ass instead of the Colt. And I knew it wasn’t him, Cas, ‘cause he’d never have said that to me. He couldn’t do it.”

There’s a beat of silence as Dean goes back to shuffling around the room, turning his unmade bed into a mountain of discarded shirts.

“Your father… I know he treated you poorly,” Castiel says after a minute or two. “But I’m sure I can’t even fathom the extent of the pain he made you feel.”

“Yeah, well…” Dean eyes him. “How much?”

“What?”

“How much do you know about… I don’t know. My past. The good ol’ days.” He brings his arms up to his chest, crossing them in a way that would look casual to anyone else. “I’ve told you some, and you must’ve seen some, you know, when you…” A pat to his shoulder where the handprint stands out beneath his undershirt, faded from time but still stark and reddish-brown, against his skin. “So how much?”

“I… hm.” Castiel knit his fingers loosely together in front of him. He thinks back, far back, trying to figure out how to answer this question in a way that would make sense to the human mind. “Putting you back together, repairing your soul… it wasn’t something that can easily be described. I saw all of you, but I also saw none of you. Hell preys on all the worst parts of your past — your deepest, most painful truths. So yes, I do know some, but imagine… imagine all of your trauma packed into a single cubic inch, spread all across your body over and over again. That’s what I had to push through to get to you.”

“Mm.” Dean nods, eyes unfocused. “So you’re missin’ the specifics.”

“In a sense.”

Dean wanders over to his dresser, pulls out another flannel. Solid burgundy. “The thing with absent fathers,” he says slowly, considering the shirt in his hands, “is that sometimes it’s worse when they’re actually around.”

That’s something Castiel can wrap his head around with ease. Before he can speak to it, though, Dean’s halfway out the door.

“Dinner with the folks. Let’s go.”

And he’s off down the hall.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> burgundy shirt burgundy shirt burguNDY SHIRT BURGUNDY SHIRT


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's all fun and games till your dad says a slur at the dinner table.

The old Winchester house is lit up like a Christmas tree as the Impala pulls into the driveway. Even Sam and Dean’s old bedrooms, the ones nobody is staying in, let a warm glow spill out onto the well-kept lawn. The pale blue siding almost looks gray as they approach the front door; even more golden light comes to greet them as it swings open.

“It’s so good to see you boys,” John says. He pulls them each in, gives them the ghost of a hug, slaps them on the shoulder before letting them go. Eileen steps through the door after them, and he smiles, the skin around his eyes crinkling. “Always a pleasure, Eileen. Grab a seat.” She does.

Then Castiel steps inside, coming to stand next to Dean. A hair closer to him than usual. The backs of their hands brush, knuckles catching.

“Castiel,” John says, injecting his voice with that same cordial note from the garage. “I didn’t know you’d be joining us. Can I get you a plate?”

“I don’t eat.”

Another blank stare from John, but Mary just laughs, pointing at a chair with no place setting with the serving spoon in her hand.

“You can sit next to Dean,” she says.

“As if he’d sit anywhere else,” Sam says under his breath, and Dean smacks him lightly in the side, a grin tugging at the corner of his mouth.

The grin fades when he sees the look in John’s eyes.

It’s quiet as everyone settles in. John and Mary. Sam and Eileen. Dean and Castiel.

John scrapes his chair closer to the table. “Should we start with an introduction?” he says, nodding in Castiel’s direction. “Sammy’s brought Eileen over plenty, but you’re a new face.”

“This is Castiel,” Dean says in a rush. “Cas. He’s m— he’s an angel.”

“What, like the baseball team?” A glance in Castiel’s direction. “You don’t seem like the type.”

Dean scoops a pile of potatoes onto his fork. “Nah, the feathery kind. Kind that helps run this joint.” With the knife in his other hand, he gestures around at the room as if to indicate that “this joint” is all of heaven.

“Huh. Imagine that.” John’s giving Castiel the once-over again, scanning him for whatever he missed the first time around. He squints at the Castiel’s shoulders like he’s looking for wings he somehow didn’t catch. “Angels watching over you. Just like your mom always said.”

Mary smiles at that. Sets her hand over his. It’s a fond smile, a genuine one. She looks between Castiel and Dean with warmth in her gaze, but Dean’s eyes are on his plate.

“So,” John says, lifting a beer to his mouth. He takes a long swig, licking his lips before continuing. “Where were you when I was still kickin’? Would’ve been a big help to have an angel on our side. Hell, would’ve been a help to have you on board from the start.”

Castiel knows what start he means. A nursery. A fire. A bloody, broken start. “I was in heaven,” Castiel says, “blindly following orders from an absent father.” He ignores the way Dean knocks his leg under the table.

“Ain’t that just the way,” John says, reaching back for the beer. He doesn’t say anything else.

Sam takes the reins after that. He talks about heaven, about his time on earth. Asks his parents how they’re settling in. Swaps stories with them, laughs at a joke from Eileen. All the while, Dean eats in silence, nodding along in feigned engagement but keeping his knee pressed to Castiel’s, almost bracing himself against it. Every time John’s eyes flit in their direction, Dean sits up a little straighter. He deflates the second his father looks away.

“So you’re a good friend of Dean’s, then?” John says once Sam runs out of idle conversation. He makes a show of reaching for the salt instead of looking at his son.

“I’m —” He bites his tongue. Dean will be the one to tell him. It’s Dean’s to decide.

“My husband,” Dean says, and shit, he’s deciding right now. He’s got his fork and knife in a grip that’s just a little too tight, knuckles half white and fists barely trembling. He takes a breath, looks up at his father. “Cas is my husband.”

Silence swallows the room. John must have known, he must have, because the two of them are wearing the same ring on the same fingers, because the way they look at each other is just — no friends look at each other like that. But somehow, hearing it out loud is what does it, what turns the spark in those dark eyes into a crackling fire. His face is impassive, but those eyes give him away, and Castiel can feel it — the way Dean shrinks, just barely, curling his shoulders, holding his breath. He reaches for Dean’s knee under the table; when he sets a hand on it, Dean flinches.

“Wanna run that by me again, son?” John says. Elbows on the table, fingers interlocked.

It’s a challenge. It’s bait. If Castiel had met this man fifteen years ago, he’d have had no clue this was anything other than fatherly table talk, but he knows this look, knows this tone. This is danger.

“Cas is my husband,” Dean repeats. He swallows, hard, and reaches blindly for the hand that’s resting on his knee. “I could give you the spiel, tell you how he’s saved my ass more times than I can count, how he’s the best man I ever met on that bitch of an earth, but I don’t think you’d care about that. So just tell me what you think. Be straight with me, Dad.”

“Straight with you.” To Castiel’s surprise, John chuckles. “Funny to hear, coming from a fa—”

Castiel stands up so quickly the whole table jolts, upsetting Sam’s wine glass, spreading red across the crisp white table runner. There’s fury boiling inside him; the air around him hums with it, static and sharp.

“Cas,” Dean says. Heavy, warning. Barely disguising the panic underneath. “It’s fine.”

It’s a stare down, but unfortunately for John, Castiel doesn’t need to blink. “Your audacity is astounding,” he says, fighting to keep his voice level as the lava churns beneath his skin.

“ _My_ audacity?” John says, barking out another mirthless laugh. He’s on his feet now, too, not giving any ground. “You come into my home, with my boy convinced he’s a goddamn queer, and think you got the right to talk to me like that?”

“I gave you this home,” Castiel growls, “and I can just as easily take it away.” He lets his eyes flash. A threat. A promise.

John barely looks fazed. “Dean,” he says, never breaking eye contact, “see this man outside.”

Dean stands without hesitation, hooking his fingers into the sleeve of Castiel’s coat. “C’mon,” he says quietly. When Castiel doesn’t move, he tugs harder. “Cas, let’s go.”

Castiel jerks his arm free of Dean’s grip. He stares at John for a moment longer, drinking in those horrible flames, before storming out the door.

“It was good to see you,” he hears Dean say. Then there’s the sound of a door swinging shut, of the crunch of Dean’s boots coming toward him on the dry grass.

“I know what you’re going to —”

“You didn’t have to do that,” Dean says, and there it is. Already playing it down, already acting like this is just another day in the life (in the death?) of Dean Winchester. “Seriously, it’s fine. I can take it. I’ve taken crap from him a thousand times.”

Castiel turns to look him in his face. “And what else have you taken?” he asks, struggling to keep his voice from shaking as much as the rest of him. “I know your father is not a perfect man, Dean, I know he’s not even a good man, but I can see that there’s more. More than him being a — a product of his time. He’s done more to you than this.”

“Yeah, and it ain’t a big deal,” Dean says. He’s standing up straight, shoulders back, hands spread earnestly at his sides.

“It certainly seems like a big deal.” Castiel takes a step forward. Another when Dean doesn’t back away. He lifts a calloused hand to Dean’s face, trying to comfort, to understand — what he doesn’t expect is the memories that start bleeding into him like that wine along the runner.

In truth, they’re barely memories; just whispers, really, of what Dean is allowing to come to the surface. A boy in a grocery store with a loaf of bread in one hand and two quarters in the other. A boy with a split lip, reading a board book to the infant in his lap. A boy with a gun, cursing when he misses the shot, firing again and again until he gets it right. A boy in a graveyard, dropping a match into a grave where two bodies lay, intertwined, bound together even in death. A boy alone. A boy afraid.

Castiel draws back, stumbling half a step before righting himself. Dean’s face is hardened. Blank.

“Dean —”

“Let’s go home.”

And that’s the end of it. Dean doesn’t say a word as they climb into the car. Silence hangs between them, heady and thick. He’s quiet for the rest of the night, but he doesn’t leave Castiel’s side for a second of it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If I had the chance to engage in hand to hand combat with John Winchester, I'd take it so goddamn fast. He'd absolutely kill me, but at least I'd go down swingin'.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dean opens up. Castiel puts on his ass kicking shoes.

“I tried talking to him,” Sam is saying, “but you know Dad. He’s never been crazy about listening to me.”

It’s morning. The four of them are scattered around the kitchen in varying states of consciousness. Sam is fully dressed, having gone for a run at the crack of dawn; Eileen is showered, perched on the island by the fridge; Castiel doesn’t sleep and is therefore wide awake; Dean is on his third cup of coffee.

“So it goes.” He’s staring vacantly across the room. “I knew that’s how he’d take it. No harm done.”

“A lot of harm done, actually. That was extremely shitty of him.” Sam’s clearly trying to dial down his indignance for Dean’s sake, but it slips through the cracks anyway.

“I’m sorry, Dean,” Eileen says. Castiel watches her study him for a moment. She mulls something over, nods her head, and taps Sam twice on the arm.

“We’ll be in the war room,” he says. The two of them leave without fanfare.

Once they’re gone, Castiel reaches across the table to set a hand on Dean’s wrist. He pulls away from the touch, just for a second, then settles into it. His eyes are shadowed from a fitful night’s sleep.

“Can I ask you somethin’?” he says, his voice all gravel.

“Of course, Dean.”

A slow blink. A rub of the eyes. “If this is heaven, why do I feel like shit?”

Castiel sighs, long and heavy. “I told Jack you wouldn’t want your father here,” he says, “but he just wouldn’t have it. He —” a soft laugh “— he insisted that all fathers must be at least a little good, because you’re good. That’s what he told me.”

“Don’t know what I did to deserve that kid,” Dean says to his coffee. “But, I mean, I do want Dad here. I do. I’m — I’m glad he’s up here.”

“No, you’re not.”

“Don’t go puttin’ words in my mouth.” He’s frustrated, but he’s too tired to put his walls up. He rubs at his brow. “I just…. after everything he did to Sam and me, he still thinks he’s entitled to his little picket-fence afterlife, but I’m… I’m not.” With this, he finally looks up, green eyes like shattered glass. “No matter what I did, what I _do_ , he doesn’t think I deserve a damn thing. I can’t be happy, I can’t have what I want, because I’m not him and I’m not Sam and it’s never me who gets to have something, it’s just me giving it to everyone else, and —”

“Dean.”

He shakes his head, a sour smile on his lips, and taps his mug against the table. “Everything is so good here,” he says. “Everyone is happy. Sam’s happy. Mom’s happy. I’m not gonna say you should send Dad to hell just ‘cause I had a crappy go of it thirty years ago.”

“Then what can I do?”

Dean blinks, confused.

“What can I do,” Castiel repeats, “to ease this burden for you?”

“It ain’t your job to do that, Cas. And I’m — I’m fine. I can handle an insult from my old man.”

“There’s a difference between an insult and an attack on the core of your being.” Castiel stands, pulls Dean to his feet despite the way he rolls his eyes.

“If he doesn’t want to apologize,” Dean says, “that’s on him.”

“For what he said last night?”

“For everything.”

Castiel tugs Dean carefully toward him. “This is heaven, Dean. Your heaven. This shouldn’t be a place where you… in your words, ‘feel like shit.’ If there’s anything I can do, anything at all —”

“Cas.” Dean’s fist falls gently against Castiel’s chest. He closes his eyes for a moment, takes a breath. Then he leans forward to press a kiss to Castiel’s lips, and the memories come back.

It’s everything. Dean shows him everything. 

When he pulls away, Castiel can feel his expression darken — hell, he can feel everything inside him darken, clouding him over with a looming, aching rage.

“Dean,” he says, “I’m going to go have a word with your father.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's almost time. It's almost time for the ass whooping. We're so close.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's time.

John is out in the front yard. He’s mowing the grass, whistling off-key. The whistle dies out when he sees who’s approaching him from the freshly paved road. He turns off the mower, leaning against the handle.

“Maybe I didn’t make myself clear at dinner,” he says. “You’re not welcome on this property, Mr….” He trails off, seeming to realize he was only given a first name in that little introduction, and oh, Castiel never knew vengeance could taste so sweet.

“Winchester,” he says.

“No, no,” John says, striding away from the mower with hands deep in the pockets of his oil-stained jeans. “I don’t think you understand, boy.”

Castiel almost laughs. “I am older than you could possibly comprehend.”

“And I don’t give half a shit.” The stubbornness radiating from this human man is palpable. There’s venom on his tongue. “Say whatever you like, but you are not a part of this family, understand? Stick to your guardian angel bullshit and go keep an eye on us all from a cloud.”

“But what kind of guardian angel would I be,” Castiel says, “if I didn’t keep Dean safe from the one monster he was never able to escape from?”

“The hell are you talkin’ about?” John says, jaw clenched.

Castiel stalks closer to him, a coil ready to snap. “Even in death, John Winchester, you bring your son pain. You bring him fear. Dean has saved the entire world more times than you’ve made him smile.” Closer. Mere feet between them now. “You’re here, in heaven, because Sam and Dean and our son are endlessly merciful.” Nose to nose, neither backing down. “I’m not.”

And he drives his knee up into John’s stomach.

His knuckles already sting two punches in, he’s horribly out of practice, but he’s not about to let that ruin a day he’s been subconsciously waiting for since he dragged his husband out of hell. He’s striking too fast for John to get a shot in, knocking him back and back and back, fist to the nose and elbow to the jaw and forehead to the forehead with everything he’s got, bloody hands bloody mouth bloody face and he can’t tell which of it’s his and which of it’s not. What’s raining down on John Winchester now, this torrent of fists and fury, it’s not divine wrath. It’s something almost entirely human.

There are footsteps behind him. He registers them in some distant part of his mind, the part that isn’t intent on tearing this man so completely apart that he can’t find the molecules to put him back together.

“Wh — Cas? Hey, _hey!_ ” Dean’s hands on his shoulders, Dean’s hands on his face, holding him steady, pulling him away. Liquid fire is coursing through Castiel’s veins, but Dean’s hold is firm. “Of all the ways to make a good impression, man, this ain’t it. Let it go.”

Heaving chest, clenched teeth. Castiel whips back around; blood wells behind John’s lip, spilling down his chin. There’s a cut under his right eye where the wedding band caught him in a punch. He’s staggering to his feet, dragging a hand across his face, wiping sweat and blood from his sunburnt skin. He doesn’t look angry. He looks smug. Pleased.

He punches Castiel in the face.

Dean puts himself between them in an instant, because of course he does, because that’s been his job since the beginning — to protect, to guard, to take the hits so Sammy doesn’t have to, so nobody has to, and he doesn’t even flinch, just takes the fists to his chest and gut and jaw, before backing out of his reach and moving an arm out to his side, blocking Castiel with it, keeping Castiel behind him.

“Dad,” he says, so carefully, “come on.” He swallows, takes a breath, waits.

“Get outta the way, Dean.”

“Dad.”

“That’s an order.”

Castiel starts forward again, but Dean catches him.

“An order.” Dean’s quiet for a moment. Then he scoffs. “I — sorry, who exactly do you think you’re talkin’ to right now?”

Of all the things he could’ve said, this one finally seems to catch John off guard. “My son,” he says, “who knows his place and will _get in line_ so I can teach this shitty excuse for an angel a lesson in —”

“That’s horseshit.”

John blanches.

“I have saved the goddamn world,” Dean says. Even, but so close to breaking. “So has Cas. Hell, he’s the _reason_ we saved it half the time. But this —” he gestures between Castiel and himself “— the _one thing_ that I made for myself with my own free will, you say I’m not allowed to have it.” His hands are shaking, but he doesn’t stop.

“I don’t just exist for you anymore, Dad. I didn’t stop the apocalypse a dozen times over just for you to call me a goddamn slur at the dinner table. Kids ain’t your attack dogs, and you know why I know that? Because I have a son. He’s the best damn kid I’ve ever known, and I sure as hell don’t deserve him, but I never hit him. Never gave him jacked-up orders. Never left him holed up in some one-star motel room with a baby brother to feed and raise and whatever the fuck else. That wasn’t tough love, Dad, it was just tough. I didn’t deserve it.

“So sorry, but you don’t get to give me orders. You don’t get to tell me who I’m allowed to love. It ain’t even about power, it’s about respect, and you haven’t done shit to earn mine.”

Dean just stares at him for a minute, drinking in the sight of his own father; finally struck dumb, finally realizing that his man isn’t his blunt little instrument after all, that he never has been. So John Winchester stands there, in some grim state of acceptance, as Dean hits him back. Just once, right to the face, and when he pulls his fist back John’s nose is dripping red. Dean shakes his hand out, opens and closes it. He’s rusty, too.

Then he turns. Grabs Castiel by the tie and kisses him, bloody and breathless. It’s all heat and teeth, bodies pressed together, until it isn’t anymore and they break apart.

“I’ll see you around, Dad,” Dean says, and he takes Castiel’s hand in his.

The two of them head back to the bunker. Neither of them spare John another glance.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Me, looking at the times that Dean has, in fact, treated Jack poorly: This was just bad writing on the showrunners' part and therefore I do not see it -_-


	7. Epilogue

John Winchester doesn’t get many visitors these days.

He spends most of his time in the garage, working on his cars. His good wrench is getting rusty; he’s not sure where to find a new one.

Mary moved out a while back. Bobby picked her up, helped her load her bags up into his truck. He didn’t question why her knuckles were stained red. The old Winchester house is quiet now.

The bunker, on the other hand, is overflowing with life. Family dinners have become such a popular event, they’re held in the war room now, potluck style. Hunters sit in chairs and on tables and scattered on the steps, beers in hand and smiles on faces. Jack stops by as often as he can.

Dean and Castiel make their rounds, swapping stories, catching up. Dean’s grinning for every second of it, his very being radiating joy. Every so often, he’ll catch Castiel’s eye; sometimes it’s to kiss him, sometimes it’s just to smile. Castiel could spend eternity watching Dean smile like that, with no fathers and no fear getting in his way.

And he will. At long last, he will.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The end <3


End file.
